The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Germanium plant botanically known as Geranium traversii×sessiliflorum and hereinafter referred to by the cultivar name ‘Thunder Cloud’.
The new cultivar originated in a controlled breeding program in Cambridge, New Zealand throughout 2000 to 2004. The objective of the breeding program was to select for Geranium hybrids having darker foliage color.
The new Geranium cultivar is the result of open-pollination. The female (seed) parent of the new cultivar is the selection designation Geranium traversii ‘Nigra’, not patented, characterized by its purple-colored foliage, and clumping growth habit. The male (pollen) parent of the new cultivar is the species designated Geranium sessiliflorum, not patented, characterized by its green-bronze colored foliage, and clumping growth habit. The new cultivar was discovered and selected as a single flowering plant within the F1 progeny of the above stated open-pollination during November 2002 in a controlled environment at Cambridge, New Zealand.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar by terminal stem cuttings since December 2002 at Cambridge has demonstrated that the new cultivar reproduces true to type with all of the characteristics, as herein described, firmly fixed and retained through successive generations of such asexual propagation.